Cosby 'liked petting, touching,' police who interviewed him testify

NORRISTOWN, Pa. (Reuters) - Bill Cosby told detectives who interviewed him shortly after he was accused of sexually assaulting a former friend at his Philadelphia-area home in 2004 that he touched but did not have intercourse with his accuser, prosecutors said on Tuesday.

Cosby, an 80-year-old entertainer best known as the star of the 1980s TV hit “The Cosby Show,” is facing his second trial in a Pennsylvania court on charges of drugging and assaulting Andrea Constand. The jury which heard his first trial on these charges last year failed to reach a verdict.

The new jury on Tuesday heard testimony from Cheltenham Township police who initially investigated the case shortly after accusations by Constand, a former director of operations for the women’s basketball team at Cosby’s alma mater, Temple University.

Prosecutors at the time declined to bring a case against Cosby, who was eventually charged in late 2015, shortly before the statute of limitations on the crime was to expire.

Police Sergeant Richard Schaffer read the jury a transcript of a 2005 police interview with Cosby in which he said that he had a consensual sexual encounter with Constand but stopped short of sexual intercourse.